


Ain't Got Wings

by glorious_spoon



Category: Agent Carter (TV)
Genre: Bittersweet, Character Study, Closeted Character, Coming Out, Friendship, Gen, Period-Typical Homophobia
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-07-29
Updated: 2018-07-29
Packaged: 2019-06-18 08:32:38
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,399
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/15481788
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/glorious_spoon/pseuds/glorious_spoon
Summary: Peggy Carter has kept enough of his secrets; what's one more?





	Ain't Got Wings

**Author's Note:**

> Inspired by [this thread](http://glorious-spoon.tumblr.com/post/176417480521/laylainalaska-glorious-spoon) about how someone like Jack would deal with being a closeted gay man in the 1940's.

He hadn't been down to this part of town in years, but even so he could feel his shoulders knotting as they walked, that familiar, nagging little voice that said _don’t be seen, you can’t be seen here._

It was different when he was younger, when he could slick his hair and put on a red tie, go down to the Bowery and become someone else for an evening. Nowadays, he had too damn much to lose. His face was known in the city; all it would take was the wrong vice cop recognizing him to send everything he’d spent his life working for crashing down in ruins. Not worth the risk.

This wasn’t personal; this was business. He was here with a badge in his pocket and a gun on his hip, Section Chief Jack Thompson chasing down a lead, not a young degenerate out for a night on the town. Of all the things he had to worry about tonight, a plainclothes vice cop getting a good look at his face wasn’t one of them.

Tell that to his gut, though.

“Jack?” Peggy said softly. “Is something wrong?”

“Nope,” Jack said, and lengthened his stride, vaguely annoyed when she kept pace easily. The bar they were looking for was just ahead, rowdy and bright enough to tell him that the owners had to be paying a regular, hefty fee to the mob. Most of the business down here had moved to private clubs with good security since the Liquor Authority had started cracking down. “You’re gonna have to do the talking, though.”

“Why?”

“Vice likes to send good-looking fellas in plainclothes down here to pick up the queers. Honeytraps.” He shrugged. “People get wise to it eventually. They’re not gonna talk to me. Not dressed like this, anyway. They’ll smell a cop. Pretty dame like you, though, that’s different.”

Peggy was silent for a long moment, but when Jack glanced over at her, he couldn’t read her expression at all. Eventually, she said, “Well, I suppose that makes for a refreshing change of pace. Usually I’m the one playing bait.”

He managed half a grin. “Enjoy it while it lasts.”

“And you?”

His heart skipped a beat. “What about me?”

“Are you going to be alright with this?” There was an unnervingly thoughtful note in her voice.

“All part of the job, Marge,” Jack said, and then, mercifully, they were at the front steps of the bar. A large man in an ill-fitting sports jacket and a poorly-concealed shoulder holster glowered down at them, and Jack sighed, reaching for his wallet. He’d pretty much expected to have to bribe his way in, and it sure as hell beat continuing this line of conversation, anyway. “Here we are. Showtime.”

* * *

Of course, Peggy Carter-Sousa had never met a lead in her life that she could just let drop. It was one of the things that made her a great agent, a formidable ally, a dangerous enemy. Usually, it was something Jack appreciated, but he’d wound up on the wrong end of her too-perceptive scrutiny enough times to be wary of it.

She waited until they were in the car, at least, their informant headed into protective custody and a team of agents descending on a nondescript aeronautics factory upstate that had apparently been cultivating all kinds of shady connections to the Kremlin.

Long enough for Jack to think that he might just be able to escape without an interrogation. Should have known better. Marge was nothing if not a master of timing.

“So,” she said as they pulled out onto the main road, her pale hand steady and firm on the wheel.

Slouched in the passenger seat, Jack sighed, pulling the brim of his hat down over his eyes. He was tempted to pretend to be sleeping, but she wouldn’t buy it, and anyway this was one of those conversations that it was probably better to get over with quickly. “So what?”

“You’ve been here before,” Peggy said. It wasn’t a question. Jack glanced at her, but she wasn’t looking at him; her calm profile was lit by the passing lights. He couldn’t tell what she was thinking. Her poker face had always been too damn good.

He took a breath, let it out, felt his fingers flex on the door handle. He could lie. He’d always been a good liar, a natural aptitude sharpened by necessity. She probably wouldn’t believe him, not if she was already sure enough to ask outright, but he could do it. It wasn’t like there was any proof. Nothing concrete, anyway.

“Jack?” Peggy asked quietly, her deadpan softening, turning oddly gentle. She was beautiful, Jack thought. She’d always been a knockout, and he wished, not for the first time, that it did anything for him at all. “I’m sorry, I shouldn’t have—”

“It’s fine,” he interrupted, looking back at the road. What the hell. Peggy already kept plenty of his secrets. What was one more? “Yeah. I’ve been here before.”

“I see.”

He glanced at her again. “You don’t sound surprised.”

“I’m not.” She turned to look at him, and arched her brow at whatever she saw on his face. “Jack, I’m a _spy_.”

“So’s Sousa. So’s everybody else we work with.” Sousa might actually have figured it out, observant bastard that he was, but if he had, he’d been keeping a lid on it. Nobody else had, though, as evidenced by the fact that Jack was still employed and out of jail.

“Perhaps I know a thing or two about…” she hesitated, then lifted her shoulder. “About pretending to be someone you’re not because that’s what everyone else expects.”

Jack considered what he knew about her background, doled out in little dollops, the odd reminiscence. A conventional childhood in a conventional middle-class family, a broken engagement, and then Bletchley Park, the SOE, the war. Yeah, he could picture how a firebrand like Peggy Carter might struggle to shove herself into the shape that world wanted for her.

It wasn’t exactly the same thing, but maybe it was close enough for kinship.

“Yeah, maybe,” Jack said eventually. “I don’t… anymore, I mean. Not in years.”

“No? You don't—” She stumbled just a bit, as though she was belatedly remembering her manners, then finished, carefully, “You don’t have anyone, then?”

“No.” And then, in answer to the question she wouldn’t ask, “Never met a guy worth that kind of risk.”

The silence stretched out for what seemed like an age. Jack slouched lower in his seat, closed his eyes, gripped the armrest so tight that his fingers started to cramp. Eventually, Peggy reached out, her warm hand settling on his elbow as the dark city swept past them. “Oh, Jack.”

“Can we just—” He glanced up at her as she braked for a traffic light, then looked away. “Can we— look, I could really use a drink. You in?”

Another silence. Jack counted his heartbeats, controlled his expression, kept it bland and indifferent as he knew how to make it. Wished, just for once, that he could turn off that calculating part of his brain running all the angles. If she said something, he’d still be fine. No evidence but her word, and that was a hell of an accusation; his star might be a little tarnished lately, but he was still the SSR’s golden boy, a decorated war hero with good family connections. It would take a hell of a lot more than one lady agent’s word to make that kind of dirt stick. Peggy had to know that. Whatever she thought of him, she had to know that.

That, and she was his friend. That was something that he’d been trying, with mixed success, to place his trust in.

Her hand was still on his arm, her grip firm enough that her fingers made points of heat through his sleeve. It seemed like they’d been sitting at that same red light for a hundred years before she finally said, “Of course I’m in. Moreover, it’s my treat, as long as you can be persuaded to put off the paperwork for tonight.”

Jack let out a long, slow breath, looking up. She was smiling at him, and he returned it with a tentative smile of his own, feeling something tight and cold in his chest loosen, just a little. “You got it, Marge.”

 

**Author's Note:**

> The NYPD really did use plainclothes officers as honeytraps in the 1940's; it was illegal to solicit a homosexual encounter, so an officer would go into gay bars, wait until a man asked him to go home with him, and arrest him (I had a source at some point, but I can't seem to track it down right now).


End file.
